Crows' Springfield Ohio Roost Really Full of Caw Caw This Year

Crows in Springfield have been unnerving residents of the Ohio city for the past few years, and this year tens of thousands of them have blanketed the city.

"It’s not only a nuisance, but it’s a health problem and a property problem," Roger Sherrock, chief executive officer of the Clark County Heritage Center, told The Springfield News-Sun.

"We’re not talking even 1,000 birds, we’re talking 50,000 to 60,000 birds that come downtown ... it’s right out of a Hitchcock movie," he said, referencing Alfred Hitchcock's 1963 horror movie "The Birds."

Shop owners have tried everything from noise machines to laser pointers to drive the birds away, but they've slowly grown accustomed to and unafraid of the tactics. Now they sit, unfazed, pooping on everything.

"The last two years were just awful. People had to cancel events because they didn't want patrons to walk through dirty walkways and it really escalated," said Maureen Fagans, executive director of the Center City Association.

"We found property owners were spending lots of money on clean up and it cost less to install (noise machines) than to pay clean up through the spring."

Altogether, the city estimates the crows have cost shop owners a collective $10,000 each year in clean-up costs, and deterred customers from spending an untold number of dollars in the downtown area. The city has spent $350 million in recent years to revamp the area, so the flocks couldn't have come at a worse time.

According to The Associated Press, no one knows exactly what has caused the murder surge, but Jim McCormac, an aviation education specialist with the state's Division of Wildlife, has a few theories.

"Crows are very smart and probably have learned they are safer in urban areas," he said.

There are few to no predators in the downtown area, and the concrete paradise likely offers more heat and wind-blocking than an open field or forest, he added.